Chapter 6

As things settled down a little I asked Caloe where I should take the thaka to gut it. Usually the men gutted their kills where they made them and then brought them back for the women to skin and cut up. I didn't know if this was plain laziness or what. There were a lot of usable parts inside a thaka that went to waste when they were field dressed, unless the men went to the trouble of bringing them back.

Caloe told me if I'd take it back out away from the campsite about a hundred yards or so that she and the others would take it from there, and I was happy to.

My next trick was going to be fetching the small come-along from my trunk and hanging the thaka from a stout tree-limb for them, but they were cutting parts off before I had the dolly out from under it, and I didn't want to seem to be telling them how to do their jobs.

Shaeta and Katia had held the calf's lead while I moved it's former mother and when I got back to them they were mostly just staring at it with amazed looks on their faces.

"Why don't you go over and introduce yourselves?" I asked.

"It won't understand what we say," Katia said.

"No, but if you let it see what you smell like it will know you, and if you pet it gently it will like you. You have to approach it slowly at first though, so it won't be frightened," I said.

"I just don't understand why it lets us do this at all. Why did it follow you back here?" Shaeta asked.

"I spent about an hour getting it settled down after I got the rope over its neck. And I spent another thirty minutes or so teaching it to follow where the halter tugged it. It isn't really old enough to know anything else to do.

"It's been following its mother around since it was born and now she's gone and we're all it has. If I'd left it where it was it would have been dead tomorrow or the next day anyway. Something would have killed and eaten it," I said.

"But it doesn't know that yet, does it?" Shaeta asked.

"Probably not, but it doesn't know anything else either, except that it wants some water, some grass, and some milk. Unfortunately it isn't going to get any more milk. I hope it can get by on just grass," I said.

"I hope so too. I kind of like it," Katia said, and then she walked slowly over toward the calf.

It didn't mind at all and actually seemed glad to have some company. Shaeta was right on Katia's heels. The calf liked their attention and within half an hour it would follow them without the need of tugging the lead. They were thrilled.

It dawned on me then that they had probably never even considered touching a live animal before. I knew that there was a kind of wild dog here, though they weren't numerous, yet none of the kwagi had ever mentioned having pets or anything like a watchdog. That would be a trick for another day though.

About two hours before sunset, groups of men started returning and most had two or three kills. Shaton, Matatu, and Caltort's small group was the only one that returned empty handed and that was expected because they hadn't been hunting. They were just exploring farther in the direction we'd been traveling.

The group that had done best was the largest one. They'd killed a bull thaka that was nearly as big as the cow I'd taken, and they also had two qaka. All the other groups had two or three qaka, but I was a big surprise to them when they found out I'd brought in a thaka on my own and that didn't even mention the calf I'd led in with me. I noticed that they didn't seem nearly as happy about it as the women had.

Hopefully it wasn't jealously rearing its ugly head already, but then again I knew it would sooner or later. There wasn't a chance in hell of any group of humans this large getting along without some friction.

My entrance had been unusual and my ways were somewhat different. I knew that sooner or later someone was going to want to put me in my place. The trouble was that none of them thought they could and I'm sure that didn't make me any more likable.

Not all the men were that petty though, and I got a surprise before the meal that night. Jagbac sought me out and introduced himself, giving me his name from the get go. I gave him mine back and then he asked me about the thaka and how I'd killed it.

As I told him, I left out the fact that I'd used a bow and arrows to do it. He didn't ask if I'd used a spear because I doubt he considered any other possibility. I'm not sure they even knew about other types of weapon.

When he asked how I captured the calf I was glad to show him the sash cord lariat and even demonstrate how it was done. He was amazed with it from the start and clearly wanted one, though he didn't asks.

Mentioning that I didn't have any more of the cord that was long enough for a lariat led to explaining that lariat meant a rope with a sliding loop on one end for capturing things. A few more minutes telling him that this rope wasn't really strong enough for anything but the smallest animals was next. I went on to tell him I intended to try plaiting a proper lariat out of rawhide.

He seemed to follow my explanations well and I hoped he would have an interest in learning to use a rope after I'd had time to make one or two. There was an even better animal than a thaka on Margata for beast of burden duties, but it would take more than sash cord to catch one. Unless I got as lucky as I did with the calf.

Cashda seemed to be nearly clones of horses. They even looked amazingly alike and I had an odd feeling that they hadn't really evolved here but might have arrived in a manner similar to mine. There wasn't much talk of cashda among the kwagi because they had practically no use for them.

They couldn't get close enough to kill them with spears for some reason they didn't understand, and they hadn't thought of trying to herd them over a handy cliff or anything of the sort.

I had my own suspicions as to why they couldn't get close enough. If the Cashda had the type sense of smell I did the kwagi would continue to only acquire them after a lucky accident, where one broke its leg and was found by a kwagi before being found by other carnivores.

Of course if they did have a super sense of smell, I couldn't slip up on them any better than anyone else could, but I knew about running them off a cliff and I also knew about trapping them in a small blind canyon, draw, or the like. Knowing it would work ahead of time was more than half the battle.

Still it would be pointless to spill the beans until I could try my hand at making a few lariats. One thing was certain about training a horse, or Cashda, especially a grown one. If you didn't have a good rope you were shit out of luck.

Available food broke up my powwow with Jagbac and though I'd enjoyed it I was ready to eat. We had stew made from parts of my early arriving kill and everyone seemed happy enough about that. I was surprised that Katia seemed to be preening and making a fuss over me nearly as much as Shaeta did, but it didn't hurt my feelings one damned bit.

In fact, my dick started throbbing when I remembered the peek I'd had of her naked honey-pot this morning. It was funny, but Shaeta looked at me almost as soon as I thought that, and damned if she didn't give me such a smile. As a matter of fact, Caloe gave me a little grin not ten seconds later. Weird if you asked me.

When we headed for our furs I knew something was up. It wasn't overt or anything, but Katia's furs were now on the other side of ours and even closer than they had been the night before. After we were settled down for sleeping, it dawned on me that I was now between Shaeta and Katia and there wasn't very much distance between me and the latter.

I tried not to get Shaeta too revved up tonight when she gave me a kiss but I didn't keep my hands off her either. After she'd turned over and wiggled her ass back against me I made sure to put my hard dick where it belonged, right between her legs. I didn't try to put it up her, yet, but I wanted to make sure it knew the way home, and she gave a contented sounding sigh as I took over a titty.

When I woke the next morning it was almost as if Shaeta was waiting for my eyes to open before she moved. She did an odd twisting around on her butt kinda and the next thing I knew I was staring right at her pretty wine-red beaver. She even opened her legs a little so I could get a good look. Hopefully my x-ray vision didn't scorch anything important.

I was speechless and it was probably a good thing. Shaeta had the creamy skin of a redhead, kinda. It looked smooth and luscious but it wasn't the alabaster that you might expect. She didn't have many freckles either and none you could see when she was dressed. She did have a wonderful spray of them around her bush though and it made me lick my own lips when I saw them.

Shaeta gave a delightful little laugh at that and then she was up and pulling on her clothes. I lay still and watched the whole thing; especially enticed by the way she wiggled her sweet looking ass as she shimmied into her skin dress.

When I was up and in my pants, Shaeta leaned over as I was lacing up my boots and asked me whose was prettier. I knew at once that she was asking about the views I'd had of her spice-box pie and Katia's. Somehow I saved my self with my question in return.

"Which moon is the most beautiful?"

She laughed at me and then she and Katia scampered off. It was a hopeless question since the moons were practically identical. They did some type of complicated dance with each other across the sky every night. They seemed to be constantly revolving around each other somehow and it was impossible to tell one from the other. It was for me anyway.